Sea Ice

Sea ice variability is a key indicator of climate variability and change in the polar regions. The primary parameters that define the state of sea ice include: concentration, area and extent, ice type, motion, deformation, age, thickness, and volume. The presence of sea ice strongly modifies surface waves and air-sea exchanges of heat, momentum, moisture and gases. Sea ice has a significant impact on the Earth’s albedo and hence changes in Sea Ice impact the global energy budget. The properties of many water masses of the global ocean and strongly influenced determined freezing and melting processes in sea ice regions.

Sea Ice Concentration

Figure: Sea Ice Concentration for the a)Arctic and b) Antarctic in June 2018.

Source: http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index.

ECV Products and Requirements

These products and requirements reflect the Implementation Plan 2022 (GCOS-244).

The requirements are found in the complete 2022 ECVs Requirements document as well: ECV Sea Ice.

Products			Sea Ice Concentration		Sea Ice Thickness		Sea Ice Drift		Sea Ice Age
	*()**	Unit	Values	Unit	Values	Unit	Values	Unit	Values
Horizontal Resolution	G	km	1	km	1	km	1	km	1
	B		5 (reg. analysis), 25 (trend analysis)		25		5-25		5-25
	T		50		50		50		50
Vertical Resolution	G				-		-		-
	B				-		-		-
	T				-		-		-
Temporal Resolution	G	d	<1	d	1	d	<1	d	<1
	B		1 (reanalysis), 7 daily monitoring		7-30		1-7		1-7
	T		30		30		30		30
Timeliness	G	d	1-2	d	1	d	1-2	d	1-2
	B		7		7		7		7
	T		30		30		30		30
Required Measurement Uncertainty (2-sigma)	G	% SIC	5	m	0.05	km d-1	0.25	d	7
	B				0.1		3		182
	T		10		0.25		10		>365
Stability	G	%/decade	5	m/decade		m/decade		d
	B
	T

Products			Sea Ice Temperature		Sea Ice Surface Albedo		Snow Depth on Sea Ice
	*()**	Unit	Values	Unit	Values	Unit	Values
Horizontal Resolution	G	km	1	km	1	km	1
	B		5-10		5-10		25
	T		50		50		50
Vertical Resolution	G		-		-
	B		-		-
	T		-		-
Temporal Resolution	G	d	3 h	d	3 h	d	1
	B		1		1		7-30
	T		7		7		30
Timeliness	G	d	1-2	d	1-2	d	1-2
	B		7		7		7
	T		30		30		30
Required Measurement Uncertainty (2-sigma)	G	K	1		1	m	0.01
	B		3		3		0.05
	T		6		6		0.1
Stability	G	K/decade	0.1		0.01	m/decade
	B		0.2		0.05
	T		0.3		0.1

(*) Goal (G): an ideal requirement above which further improvements are not necessary. Breakthrough (B): an intermediate level between threshold and goal which, if achieved, would result in a significant improvement for the targeted application. The breakthrough value may also indicate the level at which specified uses within climate monitoring become possible. It may be appropriate to have different breakthrough values for different uses. Threshold (T): the minimum requirement to be met to ensure that data are useful

Data sources

This list provides sources for openly accessible data sets with worldwide coverage for which metadata is available. It is curated by the respective GCOS ECV Steward(s). The list does not claim to be complete. Anyone with a suitable dataset who wishes it to be added to this list should contact the abombelliwmo [dot] int (GCOS Secretariat).

National Snow & Ice data Center (NSIDC)
Met Office National Centre for Ocean Forecasting (NCOF) Operational Sea Surface Temperature and Sea Ice Analysis (OSTIA)
Copernicus Marine Environment Monitoring Service
EUMETSAT Ocean and Sea Ice SAF
ECV Inventory by the CEOS/CGMS Working Group on Climate (WGClimate)

Domain:

Ocean

Subdomain:

Physical

Scientific Area:

Snow and Ice

ECV Steward:

Thomas Lavergne/Stefan Kern

Products:

Sea Ice Concentration; Sea Ice Thickness; Sea Ice Drift; Sea Ice Age; Sea Ice Temperature; Sea Ice Surface Albedo; Snow Depth on Sea Ice